stupid superstitions in India

[sling-shot]

Exactly what I mean. Think about it and if you find meaning follow else don't.
Same with religion and god and by god don't force your beliefs on others.

If possible try to educate people who follow superstitions but don't force them not to because then you are not better than them.

There are others:
- If a black cat crosses your path while going out it is bad luck

Disclaimer : The *your* in sentences above does not refer to anyone in particular. It is only used here to sound natural like a conversation.

 

[SaiyanGoku]

another one, "praying" to "god"

 

[skeletor]

I can see some sense in someone being religious, but not superstitious. Two different things for me.

 

[Inceptionist]

Actually it is opposite. I'm not advocating non-veg, but meat is easier to digest for the human body compared to cellulose. You see generally most herbivores have a huge small-intestine compared to their body size.

*answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080511205659AAEBUDg

I dunno about our old calendar, but was it exactly like this Gregorian calendar?? Only then the old auspicious Mangalvaar will be the new Tuesday. Am I right? Otherwise this new Mangalvaar isn't the old Mangalvaar on which we were supposedly not supposed to eat meat.

I'm not trying to be condescending, but can you link to something more substantial than yahoo answers where proof is provided?

As for the names of days, it is rooted in cosmology and are neither from one culture to another. Names of days are based on the observations done by humans all over the world.

*i.imgur.com/owOvDDM.png

From page 4 of this book The Power of Stars: How Celestial Observations Have Shaped Civilization - Bryan E. Penprase - Google Books

Also, Hindu calender has another way to measure a month known as tithi. Those are based on lunar cycle.

*en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tithi

another one, "praying" to "god"

What's wrong with a prayer? I've got shrine of Christopher Nolan in my room and I pray to him everyday.

 

[sling-shot]

On a lighter vein, I am happy that the shrine is not of Chuck Norris

 

[krishnandu.sarkar]

wow. I never heard of these before though I used to get don't eat non-veg on Tuesdays.


Some others I been asked to do.

- not to accept prasad with left hand (even if left hand is cleaner than right)
- not to sleep at night with legs in direction of god or south.

Do you guys have special beds fitted with compasses?

Yeah, you can google it out. Due to some pole attraction issues. Creates headache. But as said below, things change, environment change. May not be applicable everywhere, but depends.

The concept of God itself was invented by clever people to control the masses. Superstitions must have started due to some reason at that time but may no longer be relevant now hence we are making fun of them. Things change, environment changes, science has improved.

We should all think for ourselves before blinded by religious / superstitious beliefs.

-----------

The no eating with left hand rule is very logical and scientific. There are many diseases which spread through faeco-oral route eg. common jaundice, worms etc. To avoid that it was mandated that you wash your bum with left hand and handle food only with the right.

Right. This is what I'm trying to say. It doesn't mean, I'm saying all the superstitions do have some logic. But most of them do. And they were created by so called clever people who created god for the good only and to control the mass with fear.

 

[Vyom]

Some of the believes that baffles me:
1. The Fasts in the name of God (I consider it as a hunger strike against God, hence don't practice it)
2. Not eating Eggs on Tuesday and not cutting hair on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
3. Stopping to move if cat crosses the road (although I don't see this practice much now. People are in a hurry now a days to wait, lol)
4. Not eating in eclipse

And I also face these superstitions:
1. Playing with key ring, in which multiple key are attached. It's considered bad omen when keys makes sounds when they touch each other.
2. Rubbing stomach after eating (grandma use to say food transfers (teleports) to dog's stomach if you do it! I am pretty sure that was said as a lie intentionally to stop me from rubbing my stomach) But WHY?
3. Eating with right hand only (although this is a practice which I still follow, call it a force of habit, or maybe I do see some fact in it)
4. Not eating a milk product while you eat salty food like daal or sabzi (I have no way to check the authenticity of the claim that eating Kheer along with sabzi makes your skin grow those white patches like cow. So I just avoid it)
5. You don't shop during "Shradhs". And you don't buy metallic objects on Saturdays. Who The Hell wrote such rules?

Superstitious I and almost all of us follow or use to follow:
1. Refresh the screen on windows (I can't help it. I know refresh only just redraws the icons and nothing more, still I do it)
2. Ejecting the flash drive (even tho windows is built for safe removal, we wait to properly eject the drive. I agree sometimes it's important to make sure that there is no background activity going on, but most of the time, you can just unplug the pen drives)
3. Pixel race (people are just mad about PIXELS. When we can't detect increase of ppi more than 300)
4. Megapixel (most people just want MORE megapixel. So the (only) 4 MP of HTC One makes it the worst camera phone)

 

[skeletor]

I'm not trying to be condescending, but can you link to something more substantial than yahoo answers where proof is provided?

The reason why I simply linked to Yahoo was, because I expect this to be basic Class X science knowledge. I'm also not being condescending, did you give any substantial proof before claiming X is takes less time to digest than Y or vice versa?

We're omnivores actually. I guess we all know that.

I'll first begin by quoting the Class X NCERT Science book: *www.ncert.nic.in/ncerts/l/jesc106.pdf

Herbivores eating grass need a longer small intestine to allow the cellulose to be digested. Meat is easier to digest, hence carnivores like tigers have a shorter small intestine.

Carnivore Digestive System vs. Herbivore Digestive System

Neither carnivores or humans have digestive systems that break down or utilize the cellulose in plant cell walls. (Herbivores use an army of bacteria and an extended transit time to break down cellulose to a usable form.) - See more at: Carnivore Digestive System vs. Herbivore Digestive System

Human and carnivore digestive systems are designed for and equipped to eat meat. Both humans and carnivores eat and break down animal proteins, lipids and vitamins directly from animal sources. (Herbivores by definition do not eat animals, but they still need 'animal protein,' and they obtain it from the many pounds of bacteria which they continually digest.

THE ECK INSTITUTE BULLETIN

Human beings cannot digest cellulose and other fibrous starches. Humans lack the enzymes to digest cellulose and other vegetable fibers. This is a fact, even if one does not like it. Taking a cellulase enzyme might help a little, but will not overcome this problem.

Vegetable-eating animals tend to have longer digestive tracts than we do. Some also have three or four stomachs to assist digestion. A few such as cows regurgitate the food several times to help them digest raw food.

CBSE Class X question: NCERT X Science Solutions Life Processes

Ques. Why do herbivorous have longer small intestine than carnivorous?
Ans. Herbivorous animals have longer intestines than that of carnivorous animals. This is because their diet is grass and plants, made up of fibre and cellulose which are hard to digest. As a result the herbivorous animals need a longer digestive track to digest their foods completely.

A longer intestine would also host many small bacteria that process and break down cellulose into glucose, a source of energy which the host herbivore can use. Without the long intestines, animals such as cows could still eat grass, but would not be able to use the glucose stored in the grass structure.

As for the names of days, it is rooted in cosmology and are neither from one culture to another. Names of days are based on the observations done by humans all over the world.

Spoiler

*i.imgur.com/owOvDDM.png

From page 4 of this book The Power of Stars: How Celestial Observations Have Shaped Civilization - Bryan E. Penprase - Google Books

Also, Hindu calender has another way to measure a month known as tithi. Those are based on lunar cycle.

what I'm asking is, is the Gregorian Mangalvaar same as the old desi Mangalvaar of pre-Gregorian Indian era? What is Mangalvaar since the beginning of time? Which Mangalvaar is when you're not supposed to eat meat as per the superstitious people?

 

[Inceptionist]

Thanks for the detailed reply. I tried searching on my own but I don't know where to look or who to trust. Unlike websites for technology or movies where I know what are reliable sources and what are full of crap information.

And yes, Tuesday and Mangalvaar are one and the same and always were as these names are based on patterns of celestial bodies that repeat and are same everywhere.

 

[krishnandu.sarkar]

Some of it I can explain may be.

Some of the believes that baffles me:
1. The Fasts in the name of God (I consider it as a hunger strike against God, hence don't practice it)

God is just created by the cleaver ones to controll mass people. Nothing else. So all the rules you'll find almost is in the name of god. The reason is, there are some times, when you should fast. And staying like that doesn't affects your health. It's considered one to have fast every month to be healthy. Google it if you have doubt. But unfortunately, day by day the rule applicability changed only for women. Men stayed out of this.

3. Stopping to move if cat crosses the road (although I don't see this practice much now. People are in a hurry now a days to wait, lol)

My granddad used to say that cat is a very shy animal. They doesn't generally do such things if there are not such reason. Previously, there was jungle in colonies, on both sides. It was almost villages all our there, no cities. So they used to consider if a cat is running like from one side of road to other side, it's better to stop, as he wouldn't do such if he didn't smelled any fear. And at that time, there was possibility of getting tiger / snakes / other harmfull animals in to locality.

As already said above, rules were created back then in the name of god to control peoples. But time changes, environment and situation changes. So this logic is not applicable today, but people keeps following blindly.

4. Not eating in eclipse

I already said that above, it's because of sun rays kills germs, so during eclipse, that's absent which may seem to be harmfull. But this logic isn't applicable for lunar eclipse. But people keeps following blindly regardless of what type eclipse it is.

3. Eating with right hand only (although this is a practice which I still follow, call it a force of habit, or maybe I do see some fact in it)

As already said above, we (generally) use left hand to...we you know So it's better to use right hands for food in order to avoid germs. Soaps and all were not there back in those days. So water or leafs was the only way out. So they used to avoid left hands.

4. Not eating a milk product while you eat salty food like daal or sabzi (I have no way to check the authenticity of the claim that eating Kheer along with sabzi makes your skin grow those white patches like cow. So I just avoid it)

Not sure, but may be something related to reaction of both the mixtures?

 

[amjath]

^ if you go to acupuncture treatment, you are asked to avoid milk completely reason was milk has high indigestion rate

 

[skeletor]

^ if you go to acupuncture treatment, you are asked to avoid milk completely reason was milk has high indigestion rate

That is genetically related.

Lactose intolerance - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Lactase persistence - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Baker]

Another one to add is Astrology.

SMH , how many girls marriage is in chaos just because of this stupidity.

 

[Desmond]

I am not sure, but I think vegetarians get animal proteins from milk.

Yes, I don't believe milk is vegetarian food.

 

[Anorion]

I used to think superstitions have some kind of cultural origins, but now think it is more of a psychological thing that repeatedly originates spontaneously, after seeing some superstitious beliefs about drops in an MMO

Gods in India also consume milk
Nazar suraksha kavach
Avoiding evil eye by placing photo/painting of eye on house
Avoiding demons by placing casts of demons on house
Horseshoe over door
Witchcraft and black magic
Numerology and Vaastu Shastra
Reiki
Neem and Banyan tree creating immune boosting "atmosphere" around themselves
God's in Temples being at the center of some kind of flowing magnetic energies
Positive energies emanating from diyas
Touching elder's feet for blessings

 

[lywyre]

Chill down people. It is not like only us Indians are superstitious. Superstitions were/are abound all over the world by people of all religion.

If we know the right reason why we are doing (or not doing) something at specific times, then it is no longer a superstition (unless there is no valid reason).

 

[Gen.Libeb]

I am not sure, but I think vegetarians get animal proteins from milk.

Yes, I don't believe milk is vegetarian food.

The way I look at it.. Chicken, Fish, Egg etc. You are taking away a life. Not the case with milk

 

[seamon]

The way I look at it.. Chicken, Fish, Egg etc. You are taking away a life. Not the case with milk

You are under nourishing the calves, so basically you are starving them.

 

[skeletor]

The way I look at it.. Chicken, Fish, Egg etc. You are taking away a life. Not the case with milk

Life = self-sustained metabolism and response to stimuli. So do have plants, may be just not the neural. No matter what you eat, you're eating some other life-form to sustain yourself.

Growing crops these days involves use of things like insecticides. Again loss of "life". Not to mention afterwards when you harvest crops. The medicines you take, experiments are conducted on animals. The furniture in your home is obtained by cutting trees.

The only argument which goes in favour of being vegetarian is, trying to be as low as possible in the food chain as the 10% energy transfer from low level to the level up holds true. If you are low in the food chain, you're sort of getting your energy directly from the sun, with minimum wastage.

Egg isn't alive until fertilised. Fertilised eggs are not for consumption.

Despite being born in a vegetarian family, I was taught to eat non-veg from a young age, may be I was introduced to it by my cousins. My father had faced problem when he went outside India. The change of thoughts my grandmother had regarding this issue is very interesting. She didn't mind me eating non-veg and eating while sitting right next to her. It became a non-issue for her. I hardly eat non-veg anyway. Once in a month or so.

 

[Anorion]

Chill down people. It is not like only us Indians are superstitious. Superstitions were/are abound all over the world by people of all religion.

yep, but we do have some funny ones, and superstition need not have anything to do with religion. Evil Eye, Witchcraft are examples.

there are many types of vegetarianism, whole spectrum of it, and that has nothing to do with violence against plants or animals, more to do with accepted norms
for some fish is veg
for some mushrooms are non veg